Language at Leeds Distinguished Speaker Lecture: Prof Karen Bryan

This event is open to all, and may be attended in-person (University of Leeds, Liberty Building LG06) or online.

Youth offenders are a rising population, with the number of proven offences committed by children increasing year on year, rising by 4% in 2024 to around 35,600. A growing body of evidence shows that early language acquisition difficulties, speech and communication needs, and poor educational attainment are disproportionately represented among young people in contact with the justice system. Yet these factors are often treated as peripheral rather than foundational risks. In this lecture, we will examine the interconnecting factors that can either protect against, or heighten vulnerability to, offending and mental health challenges, highlighted by the compounding risk model (Bryan et al., 2015). The lecture also considers implications for prevention and practice, arguing for earlier identification and language-informed educational and justice responses. By reframing language and learning difficulties as treatable risk factors rather than secondary symptoms, professionals can better design interventions that reduce trajectories toward exclusion and offending.

Professor Karen Bryan OBE is Vice Chancellor and Chief Executive of York St John University. Karen qualified as a speech and language therapist from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and also gained her PhD there. Her research interests are in communication difficulties in young offenders and in forensic populations. Also, the impact of communication difficulties on access to healthcare. She is involved in the development of Registered Intermediaries working for the Ministry of Justice, and was previously a member of the Health Professions Council. Professor Bryan is a Visiting Professor in the Department of Neuropsychology at the University of Warsaw, and is a Fellow of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.

The lecture will be followed by a roundtable discussion with interdisciplinary experts:

• Abigail Harrison Moore is Professor of Art History and Museum Studies in the School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies at the University of Leeds. She started her career as an art and art history teacher in HMP Wakefield, subsequently led a Collaborative Doctoral Project on taking museums into prisons, and is a Trustee ofCommunARTy, a charity focused on raising awareness of, and support for, the arts as a form of prisoner rehabilitation. She has recently written about her experience in prisons:I taught art in a high-security Pr*son – Waiting for the Out took me straight back to my classroom.
• Professor Mitch Waterman is chair in Forensic Psychological Science at the University of Leeds. He served as the academic advisor for a large-scale intervention addressing boys' underachievement across 70 schools, providing direct insight into early educational and developmental barriers. His current research examines how adverse childhood experiences influence the trajectory of antisocial behaviour and offending. Additionally, he teaches the specific evidence-based factors related to the development of delinquent and criminal behaviour in young populations.
• Kate Brown is Professor of Social Policy and Criminal Justice at the University of York and Co-Director of the ESRC Vulnerability and Policing Futures Research Centre. Her research focuses on lived experiences of vulnerability; especially in policy and practice contexts where people are vulnerable and also criminalised. She has led qualitative and co-produced studies on youth vulnerability, sex work policing, county lines and child sexual exploitation. Before her academic career Kate worked for a decade in voluntary sector organisations supporting sex workers, young people affected by drug use, and women and children experiencing domestic abuse. For 15 years she was a Trustee for Basis Yorkshire, an award-winning regional sex work and child sexual exploitation charity.

Event Venue

The Liberty Building, Moorland Road, Woodhouse, United Kingdom

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